Desert World Allegiances

by Lyn Gala

  Footsteps came running, and Temar flinched back, even though the person came up behind Ben, far enough away that they didn’t pose any immediate threat. At the gesture, Ben gave Temar a knowing smile that made his guts roll and churn.

  “What’s going on? Do we have a problem?” The newcomer was a man with a narrow face.

  “I guess that depends on whether we caught our intruders coming or going.”

  The man frowned at Temar. “Isn’t that—”

  “He’s going to tell us who came with him.”

  “But—”

  “So, young sandrat,” Ben said, his smile faltering as he considered Temar, and Temar could feel the danger, like sand shifting under his feet. “Who did come with you? Shan? Some school friend? Or are you actually alone?”

  Temar’s feet grew so heavy he could only watch Ben and this new man.

  “Did he get down there?” the new man asked.

  Ben seemed to think on that for a few long seconds. “We have to assume he did,” Ben finally said. “Get the Suettes down there to check all the pipes and lines. If something’s wrong, we need to know before we have a disaster.”

  “That will slow us down by hours, maybe days.”

  “Which is better than having the launch fail,” Ben pointed out. “The storm is going to keep anyone at bay, and if the Suettes get down there now, we can get off planet by tomorrow. There’ll be plenty of time for us all to catch up on sleep when we’re on the ship.”

  The second man looked unsure, but after a bit, he nodded and headed back down into the sunken base. Ben pursed his lips. “And now we need to talk.”

  Temar watched, feeling like a sandrat caught in a pipe trap. Something moved behind him, and he tried to spin around, but arms caught his shoulder. Someone almost threw him against the wall, and Temar tried to kick out, but his legs were weak from having stood so long with his knees locked. He couldn’t get in a good kick, and before he could do anything, he felt strong arms catch him around his elbows, trapping them against his body.

  “I got him!” a man called, and heavy footsteps suggested that Ben was coming. Temar’s body finally caught up with his mind, flooding him with fear that made his heart pound so hard he could feel the pressure behind his eyes.

  “Excellent. Is everyone okay up there?”

  “Devin’s hurt pretty bad.”

  Temar felt a familiar hand wrap around his wrist, and then Ben yanked him away from the man who had jumped Temar from behind.

  “Get him down to medical.”

  “Why do you care? You’re killing how many people on Livre? Why do you care if you let one more die?” Temar demanded. His fear made his throat constrict, but he wouldn’t live in fear of Ben’s fists anymore. At worst, Ben would kill him, and unless Shan could stop their rocket, Ben was going to pretty much kill everyone Temar had ever loved by leaving them to die on a water-starved world.

  “Such a black-and-white world you see,” Ben said, with the sort of fondness parents used when discussing their children’s mistakes, but Temar wasn’t a child. He yanked at his arm, trying to free it. The wrist popped painfully, but Ben essentially dragged Temar back toward the grate while the other man headed back out the other end of the tunnel. “Shan, I have our little friend in hand.” Ben’s free hand came down on Temar’s ass with such force that Temar yelped before he could stop himself. “Did you hear that?” Ben called. “If you don’t come out, I’m going to amuse myself by doing a lot more damage to him.”

  “There’s no one down there,” Temar complained loudly, hopefully he was loud enough for Shan to hear and understand that he had to get his job done—he had to sabotage the rocket.

  “That’s fine. That means that I can take all the time I want hurting you,” Ben said in a voice only slightly lower. Temar’s knees started shaking.

  “Enough,” Shan’s voice came from somewhere below them, echoing against the concrete. “What kind of man hurts someone half his size?”

  Ben looked down through the grate. Part of Temar wanted to do the same. He wanted to look down, but his eyes were locked on Ben. He felt as if the world would start spinning if he looked away from Ben for even one second.

  “Find someone to surrender to or climb on up,” Ben said in a friendly voice, “but every second you aren’t standing right here, I have Temar to amuse me.” When Ben looked up and met Temar’s eyes, Temar could feel his stomach lurch and roll so badly that he nearly threw up all over Ben, and he was pretty sure that wouldn’t end well at all.

  Chapter 23

  SHAN fought against an urge to shake his arms free of his two guards, but he didn’t have a lot of power here, and if these people would kill a planet full of people to save themselves, Shan figured he didn’t have much of a chance with them. That sense of helplessness was worse because he didn’t know these two. They’d been in the mechanical room where Shan had surrendered, standing dangerously close to the valves that Shan had closed and then snapped off. He didn’t know how long that would slow the group down, but at this rate, Shan figured that God would have to take a more direct approach if he wanted to save Livre. Shan had managed to fail rather spectacularly. He’d failed his planet, and he’d failed Temar.

  The two guards led him up a flight of stairs, but instead of heading up the corridor that angled slightly up and out, they led him farther into the complex. They passed Reddy Chilan. Shan had performed his marriage, but the man didn’t even blink at the sight of Shan under guard. The guards finally came to an open door, and one went in ahead while the other stood behind Shan, holding Shan’s upper arms so hard that Shan could feel the bruises forming.

  Without arguing, Shan went into the room and found Ben sitting behind a desk, his left arm wrapped around Temar’s waist, forcing Temar to stand next to him, their bodies touching. Shan felt ill.

  “Well, if it isn’t the priest.” Ben’s smile left Shan with an urge to punch him in the nose. It’d been a long time since Shan had fought, and back then he generally fought with and lost to Naite, but for Ben and his unctuous smile, Shan could make an exception.

  “Temar, are you alright?” Shan asked as his two guards took up positions on either side of him.

  Temar gave a quick nod, but he looked a rather alarming shade of white. The worst part was that Shan couldn’t do anything to protect him. Ben had the power here, and all Shan could do was try to distract the sadist. Never before had Shan felt hate, not like this.

  “How could you, Ben?” he demanded. “How could any of you?” Shan turned and looked at his two guards. Neither looked impressed with Shan’s moral objections.

  “Do you really think the better answer is to stay on this lump of sand until we all die?” Ben demanded. However, his arm loosened, allowing Temar the smallest fraction of an inch between them. Shan counted that as a victory.

  Narrowing his eyes, Shan glared at the man. “Unfortunately, you aren’t in any danger of dropping dead, any time soon.”

  Ben leaned back in his chair. “I want children. I want a family. I want to watch grandchildren and great grandchildren running around a farm. I want to have something that survives after me. Do you really think any of that is possible on Livre?”

  “If you want that, find a woman to give you children instead of stealing from others’ children.”

  For a second, Ben shook his head with this expression, like he was trying to be patient with a particularly stupid child. “Don’t you get it? Don’t you see what you’re doing? You’re bringing children into this world to die. You’re pigs bred for slaughter, and this is the pen.” Ben gestured toward the room, and that freed Temar. Instead of running, Temar inched backward, so he was about six inches away from Ben, and then he stopped. Shan’s mouth went dry as he realized that Temar was too afraid to move away. He was too afraid to run. Shan was going to hell for dragging Temar back into his worst nightmare.

  “This is our home,” Shan said from between clenched teeth.

  “Our dying home. I won’t die l
ike a pig, slaughtered because of some war up there that I can’t control.”

  Shaking his head, Shan realized that’s what really had Ben upset. He couldn’t control the inner planets and their distant war, and he couldn’t handle that. Sometimes Shan chafed under Div’s constant belief that God would fix whatever needed fixing. Sometimes Shan felt a seed of resentment at the idea of turning everything over to faith. However, he never felt Ben’s need to control everything. “That’s what this is really about… control,” Shan said, his voice thick with disgust. “You’re so in love with your control that you can’t give it up. You have to control your farm and your farmhands and Temar and now, the whole world. You’d destroy the world just to control it.”

  Ben’s smile was a little tighter, but he kept smiling. “I’m being logical.”

  “You’re being immoral.”

  “Gods save us from priests.” Ben threw both his hands up in the air, as though disgusted. “What’s the morality of letting yourself die? Isn’t that like suicide? I thought you church folk were against suicide. And you know, that’s exactly what it means to stay on this rock.”

  Shan vehemently shook his head, denying the charge. “We’re finding new ways to breed drought-tolerant crops every year.”

  “We’re learning how to die slower,” Ben interrupted.

  “You’re speeding things along by stealing water from the entire planet.” Shan spit out the words, and he could feel the taller of the two guards shift nervously. Water theft carried with it such a terrible stigma on Livre that the guard twitched his body, clearly bothered by the charge. Shan made a mental note to work on turning the guard to their side as soon as they were away from Ben. Shan had no doubt that Ben would cut out Shan’s tongue before allowing him to talk a guard into thinking about the moral consequences of his behavior.

  “The rest of you might lose ten or fifteen years from this. That’s all,” Ben said dismissively. “If we can’t get help to come back to Livre, then your children instead of your grandchildren will die and end up food for sandcats. That is, unless they kill each other over water first. I won’t be part of that.”

  “You’re talking about things that may never happen. The war—”

  “The war doesn’t matter,” Ben said, cutting him off. “They’re going to leave us here to die. I won’t have my children be pawns in their game.”

  “And when you get up there? What will you be then? A poor farmer from a poorer world?” Shan’s cold words finally wiped the smile off Ben’s face. For one shining moment, the mask slipped, and Shan could see the monster within the man. Then the same old smug expression slipped back into place.

  “I’ll be the one who survived long enough to stand in a court and press a legal suit for breach of contract. I’ll force those inner planets to face what they’ve done.”

  “And then what?” Shan pressed. “Send rescue? Force them to finish the terraforming? Are you really trying to pretend that you’re the hero here?”

  The tall guard spoke up. “It’s a better plan than sitting here and dying with our world. At least some of us will live. At least there’s a small chance we can get the established worlds to come back.”

  Sadly, Shan could tell from his earnest expression that he meant that. He was an idiot, but he was a devoutly earnest idiot.

  “This isn’t about rescue,” Shan said. He focused on the guard even though he could hear Ben’s chair slide across the floor as he stood up. “This is about Ben’s need for power… his need for money.”

  “Don’t pretend to know me, priest. You sit in your church and wait for God. I’m taking action.” Ben was standing now, leaning over his desk with both hands flat against the top. Shan glanced behind Ben to where Temar was a pale shadow of himself. Shan could feel hate like a small beast clawing at his guts, as if he was a pipe plant and hate was a sandrat caught inside to run and run in circles. But instead of dying, the hate was seeping into his soul. He could feel his hands clench into fists.

  “I know what you did to Temar.” Despite the fact that Shan’s voice came out a whisper, the room went silent. The tall guard stilled his restless shifting, and Ben’s face froze.

  It took several seconds for Ben to shake himself free. “He enjoyed it. Hell, he begged for my touch.”

  A shiver took Shan. “You sick bastard,” he snarled.

  “Call me what you will, but I’ll survive. Temar would have survived too, if he’d stayed with me. I never would have left him to die. I actually care about him, not like you or the others. I never left him out in the world to get himself in trouble.”

  Up until now, Temar had remained frighteningly silent, but now he spoke up, his voice much more steady than Shan had expected. “I would rather be dead than live with you.”

  Ben whirled around. “Boy, you know that’s not true.” From his tone, he actually believed his own words. He sounded shocked.

  Temar nodded, his face losing even more color. “Yes, it is.”

  “Temar.” Ben’s voice was sharp, an unambiguous warning. “You know I was always fond of you. I promised to protect you, and I did.” The tone was so sincere that Shan had to wonder whether Ben had simply stopped engaging with reality at some point. More, he wondered how no one on Livre had ever noticed the monster living in their midst. The town had largely ostracized Shan’s father. They might not have known exactly what Yan Polli had done, but they all recognized the moral rot at his center. But Ben… he smiled at all the right times, and even now he maintained such perfect innocence that Shan had trouble reconciling him with the monster who had raped Temar and who now stole water that would be life or death, no matter what lies he told himself to justify his own selfishness.

  Temar brought his hands up, so that his elbows were bent, as if preparing for a fight. Shan could see the slight tremors travel through his hands. “What you did… that wasn’t protection,” Temar said, his voice even more firm, even though the rest of his body screamed out his fear.

  “Oh? The others would have killed you. I protected you, fed you, loved—”

  “Raped me,” Temar cut him off. At that, the rest of his blood left his face, and he was so pale that Shan felt himself grow more alarmed.

  “You traded your affection for security, and I did more to protect you than your father ever did.” Ben reached out, and Temar flinched back and brought an arm up to block the touch. Temar lurched backward, and Shan instinctively moved forward, only to have the guards on either side catch his arms and hold him tight. With no help, Temar’s break for freedom didn’t last long. Ben moved fast for a large man, and he caught the arm Temar had used to block his first touch. Yanking on the arm, Ben pulled Temar close. Despite the small, animalistic cry, Temar couldn’t resist. He did, however, get in one good punch to Ben’s side. Ben gave a startled oomph and then wrapped his other arm around Temar, hugging him so close that Temar could only struggle, silent despite the frantic squirming.

  “Hush, boy. The priest certainly hasn’t improved your temper, but think about this—if you come with us, you live. You live in a world where water and computers and life are guaranteed.” The struggle continued for several minutes, and Shan tried to pull his arms free, but the guards held him tightly while Temar was left to fight alone. Eventually, Temar stilled.

  “And if I don’t, you’ll kill me with Shan?” Temar demanded, breathless from his desperate effort.

  Ben laughed. “I don’t plan to kill the priest. If he wants to stay on his planet, he can. We’ll be long gone, and any revenge he or his council may dream about will be far out of their reach.”

  “So, you plan to let us go?” Shan asked, confused. That didn’t sound likely, coming from Ben.

  Sure enough, Ben shook his head. “Since I doubt you’ll tell us exactly what you did to the equipment, we’ll have to do a full check of all systems, which may take some time. You’ll stay here until we’re ready for liftoff. We even have a room with a nice view of the launch pad. You can see the rocket lift off.” Ben
smiled, and in that instant Shan realized what he was really saying… they’d have a nice view of thousands of gallons of water rushing down to break the sound waves that would rise from the bottom of the pad. The waste made Shan’s stomach churn. Ben’s arms wrapped tightly around Temar didn’t help the sense of overwhelming nausea that threatened.

  “Take them to the viewing deck on four, and lock them in.” Ben gave the order and slowly loosened his arms around Temar, his gaze locked on the younger man. With the two of them standing next to each other, Shan couldn’t help but notice how much younger and physically smaller Temar was. His blond hair stuck up every which way, the result of being held close to Ben’s chest as he struggled, and his eyes were so light brown they were almost the color of amber glass. Ben was barrel chested and a good eight inches taller and fifteen years older. The thought of Ben forcing Temar horrified Shan so much that he could feel acid burn the bottom of his throat. Temar had strength that Shan couldn’t even fathom, but physically he couldn’t compete with Ben.

  Ben’s smile turned almost fatherly. “You can still come with us, Temar. The others won’t like it, but you know I will always put you before them.” The tone was so avuncular that Shan really wondered if Ben could even understand the damage he’d done.

  “I’d rather die,” Temar said, spitting the words out as he stood with Ben’s hands still on him, his back stiff.

  Ben narrowed his eyes, but he didn’t comment as he took a step back and let Temar go. “Take them both to the viewing deck,” he ordered, all emotion gone from his voice. One of the guards caught Shan’s arm and tugged him toward the door. It was the shorter guard, and Shan was grateful that the one who seemed to have a seed of morality left in him was left to take hold of Temar. They were two and two now, so maybe they could fight their way free. Shan tried to make eye contact with Temar, to somehow communicate the need to fight back. However, Temar had his eyes closed as Shan’s guard pulled him out of the room.